Desultory Reading Highlights From A Wandering Page
A miscellany of 19th century notes touches on jade tipped spades from New Zealand, a woman burned to death after setting a straw-stool alight, Belgium’s small size yet large fruit exports, Indiana orphan and poorhouse statistics, campanology origins in Egypt, a vast criminal history book on Dr. Buchanan, Haldane’s oxygen respirator for miners, and Brooklyn bootblacks using electric hat cleaning.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
New Zealand
Emily Sparks
Thomas Station
Kingdom of
Belgium
Maryland
Indiana
Robert W. Buchanan
J. 8. Haldane
London
Brooklyn
Secret for Girls Promotes Liver Balm as Beauty Secret
An old set advertisement claims bad complexions stem from a troubled liver and promotes Dr J H McLean's Liver and Kidney Balm as superior to creams or enamels. It includes regional testimonials from Iowa and Kentucky about a husband nicknamed Ducky for loving water and another lines.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
J. H. McLean
Iowa
Ducky
Kentucky
Hall's Catarrh Cure Ad and Fragmented Snippets
An assortment of old time advertisements and quotes include Hall's Catarrh Cure offered at price 750 and other medical salves. The snippet collection also contains humorous exchanges about marriages and a mix of product pitches and stray phrases from a period newspaper page.
Knowledge Brings Comfort And Improvement In Life
The piece extols a remedy, praising its laxative effects and pleasant taste. It emphasizes how adapting to the remedy improves wellbeing, relieves headaches and fevers, and promotes comfort and enjoyment for those who use it. The tone mirrors a period advertisement.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Em J
Gold Mines and Merry Christmas Discovery Story
A hunting party holiday trip in California yields a gold mine when a horse slipped on a steep trail revealing a rich ledge nicknamed The Christmas Gift. The tale links the Comstock finds to Finney and a later claim dispute with Comstock himself. In New Mexico a miner’s haversack ignition exposes powder and quartz glittering with gold, creating the Nick o' Time mine in an instant.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
California
San Francisco
Comstock
New York Advertiser
Finney
Potos
South America
Custer
Big Horn
Iblo
New Mexico
John Quincy Adams
Adams
Nick O
Squire’s Office Fixes A Marriage In A Wagon Hold
A Detroit Free Press anecdote recounts a gander legged man negotiating a marriage license with a squire who lacks power to wed without the bride present. The suitor hurries to fetch the horses and gas, offering fifty cents to seal the deal, while the bride sits outside in a wagon. The piece ends with a quip about a New York socialite’s dressing habits.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Detroit Free Press
Japanese pipes and smoking habits described
The text describes Japanese smoking customs with small metal bowls on pipes, bamboo stems, and metal mouths. It notes tobacco cut very fine, resembling blond hair, and declares it to be high quality. It mentions a single pipeful is usually all that is smoked and that inhalation is done with the smoke exhaled through the nostrils.
It Is Impossible to Spell the College Correctly
A girl laments to her mother that she cannot spell a college name in a letter to Herbert. She expresses despair and frustration as she discards the attempt. The mother asks what is wrong, and the scene centers on spelling difficulty and parental concern.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Herbert
Unclear Natural History Noted in Readers Letter
A passage questions belief in life after burial and mentions “Traveler-Hindoo” magicians and Darwinian ideas. It also oddly references unevolved ancestors and the seventeen year locusts as possible connections to life cycles or resurrection concepts.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Hindoo
Take No Substitute for Royal Baking Powder
Take no Substitute for Royal Baking Powder. It is Absolutely Pure. All others contain alum or ammonia.
Fragmentary miscellany of odd facts and legends
A collage of curiosities and snippets from history. Flying frogs in Borneo, cave dwellers in Spain, leper laws in Louisiana, tobacco bans for miners in twenty states, a diamond mine ostrich egg, the California lion known as the puma, catamount, cougar or panther, Arne famed for Rule Britannia, honey guides in Africa guiding bees, hair structure facts, Birmingham enslaved men keeping silver quarters under their tongues, a Sing Sing inmate's failed Paris Green poisoning followed by a perilous river plunge.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Borneo
Spain
Louisiana
West
Arne
Alfred
Birmingham
Ala
Sing Sing
N. Y
Paris
Lion Coffee Premium Offer Draws Pictures and Gifts
The Woolson Spice Co of Toledo Ohio offers fine pictures books a knife and game in exchange for large Lion coffee wrapper lion heads. Enjoyed for the price Lion coffee includes a picture and card in every one pound package and readers can request the illustrated premium list from their grocer or by mail.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Woolson Spice Company
Toledo
Ohio
From Oddities and Notices of the Day in a Historic Page
A collage of quirky facts and notices: Baltimore’s first electric rail, Russia’s jewels valued at 11 million, elephants living up to 150 years, Paris cops on bicycles, Baltimore’s one fourth colored population, new blotting paper on bicycle handles, 608 candidates for a post office job at nine pounds weekly, a New York man’s watch dogs wary of brass buttons, a Jersey City policeman chasing a thief on a trolley, venison abundance in London, and deer sent to market. Also advice on teething for babies and a garbled note about the Coryphees’ union and a stray line about people who see and think, ending abruptly.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Baltimore
Russia
Paris
New York
Jersey City
The
Times
London
Notable Boyhoods From History and Art
A compilation of brief notes on famous figures sharing early lives in shops farms and workshops. Kant, Keats, Powers, Calvin, Turner, Washington, Lincoln, Schumann, Luther, Chaucer, Wagner, Napoleon, Jefferson, Cromwell, Newton, and Webster are linked to the trades and environments that shaped their youths.
MENTIONED IN THIS ARTICLE
Kant
Keats
Powers
John Calvin
Turner
Washington
Lincoln
Schumann
Luther
Chaucer
Wagner
Napoleon
Thomas Jefferson
Oliver Cromwell
Sir Isaac Newton
Daniel Webster
Also Mentioned on This Page
Hall
Smith
Solemly
Kc. C.G. Clark Co
New Haven
Robbins
Higbee
Karl
Comstock Lode
Potosi
Westside Boulevard
Grand Opera House
Texas
Window
Coryphees’ Protective Active Union
Pierce
Cure
Macare Crownba
Crowley
Wr. Pierce
Custom Mill
J Adams St
MAI
Jiagee
Gounty
Waermas Severares Uree
M. RP. A
W. RP. A
Waerees Swsraren Asrow
Daily Telegraph
V.s. Morgan
Geo
National Reform Press Associatio
W. AR
U. Ot
This is just the beginning! Our collection holds over 300 years of history, including rare newspapers, obituaries, marriage records, birth records, and so much more—most of which you won’t find anywhere else!